seems that early in the am flights are the most likely to go. Wish you lots of luck traveling now!
Yeah and that’s the flight we are on 
the first flight out for the day because I wanted to maximize our time in Boston before his audition.
Fingers and toes crossed for you!
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Happy Friday! My daughter is a jazz vocalist applying to Temple, Peabody, UCLA and USC. For context, we are Black, extremely liberal Californians, limiting where we feel comfortable sending her based on statewide politics, and additionally, for her, the weather. She’d be willing to suck it up for Philadelphia and Baltimore.
She finished one set of prescreens last weekend, and we’ll finish recording next weekend. She’s also a musical theatre artist and has been submitting self-tapes since the first week of staying home in the pandemic. To keep her sanity and mine, I encourage no more than 3 takes. She’s gained enough experience now that she knows perfection doesn’t have to be the goal (but she is a perfectionist like any other artist). She has a good grasp, and doesn’t get annoyed if I remind her this is to get in the door because yes, doing it over and over can, in fact, just result in a worse video performance.
Really hoping to find another jazz vocal hopeful!
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My “lived for the beach” California kid did just that. He loves the east coast! And there seems to be more work (at least for classical instrumentalists) compared to where we live.
His goal is to not need a car until he turns 30 which is so doable there. And impossible in California.
Good luck!
Good to know- there’s also the decrease in international students.
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Hoping your son’s first audition went smoothly for him today. 
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That drive for perfection is not just doing recordings for auditions/screenings, it comes with the territory with musicians. My son’s group have in the past year recorded music for albums, and it was the same way working with the engineer to get ‘just the right sound’…..comes with the territory. I can tell you based on my son’s experience and with what people who have done audition screens say that they don’t expert perfection and are looking for musical expression and overall performance ability. Obviously sloppy intonation or poor tone control or sloppy playing overall won’t do, but slips will be there. I’ll be honest, if they see a perfect recording they may suspect that someone used AI based recording tech to basically clip together a recording from multiple takes and synch it with the video (speculation, but given what I have seen AI can do, wouldn’t be surprised if schools are facing this)
Teachers often tell students that when practicing, treat it as a performance, use that mind set (well at least in the limited circle I know of:). I also have heard from my son and from other musicians who have recorded in the studio that not having an audience changes the dynamics of recording. Arnold Steinhardt of the Guarneri quartet in one of his books talked about recording in the studio versus live with an audience and he said that recording in a studio (to him) didn’t work musically as well as live, that when in a studio you lose some of the musicality and other elements.
As as suggestion try having the student record with a small audience (family members, maybe the dog and cat..no parrots though, they tend to comment smile) and see if that helps them get into the flow of recording. Obviously kids can be self conscious and may find this too nerve wracking but it may work with a student struggling to get into that peformance space versus recording an audition and focusing on being ‘perfect’.
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Thanks it went really well We should have an answer around 12/11
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My son officially finished recording all of the pieces he needed for prescreens last night. (Feels like such a victory in itself.) Now he needs to write all of his response answers to the conservatory application prompts but that is less daunting. We are hopping a plane to London in 3 weeks for his first batch of live auditions (RAM, RCM, Guildhall); due to the uk dates landing across Thanksgiving time he only misses 3 days of high school instead of an entire week. No matter the results, this will be a good test run before he does US auditions in February. If anyone reading this is planning on trying the UK conservatory path next year for their kid feel free to message me, we are definitely learning as we go! They are on a different time schedule than the US schools: applications opened in July, due by Oct 2, assigned audition dates/times a few weeks after submitting applications, live auditions in late Nov/ early Dec with results posted by third week of December - meaning he’ll be hearing results from UK at the same time as he starts receiving prescreen results from US schools.
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That’s soooooo exciting! You need to post a full recap once you guys get back! Best of luck!!!
It’s kind of nuts! We must have changed our minds as a family at least 5 times on if he was going to do the live auditions in London or do their NYC satellite audition options. Each of the 3 conservatories has a completely different date for NYC and they are all after the Nov/dec results come out so we balanced the idea of one big trip (and the flying with cello) vs lots of tiny trips (it’s about a 5 hour drive to ny for us) plus we heard they give out a big amount of their merit to the London auditioners and wanted our kid to see what it was like at the schools for such a big decision. We know they are tough schools to get into but finally decided when else will he have this opportunity?
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Nuts but super exciting! I would have opted to travel to London as well, especially since it allows you to see their campuses in person which is HUGE.
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My son got through the EA prescreen for UM Frost yesterday. He had his FSU audition last weekend (they are super organized there and their Music LLC is really nice!), we are currently at FIU for his in-person audition. There was supposed to be a theory test but he was told it was somewhat remedial and if you were more advanced that you didn’t need to bother with it. I thought that was interesting. Next weekend is Berklee. We are still waiting to hear back from UNT on whether he moves beyond the pre-screen or not.
He’s taping his final prescreen videos tomorrow and then it will be full force to finish up all of those early December applications.
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Frost and UNT were the most organized audition days we attended. SO smooth. Berklee was a hot mess, hope it has improved!
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Lol, so now that fall has finally arrived with rain and temps in the low 60’s, yesterday, she declared she’s “not sure she can handle east coast winter,”“which is colder, Baltimore or Philadelphia?” “do people in college dress up? I don’t want to look dumb walking around in a puffer.”
Haha! Temps are similar in the two cities. And will probably feel cold to you and your daughter. Philly is almost always windy which makes it feel colder.
People dress in pufffer jackets all the time. I bought a knee length puffer coat which takes up little room in a suitcase. And pack a beanie. Also, we tend to walk everywhere when we are there. So comfortable shoes. We noticed most people even go to nice restaurants and concerts in warm walking shoes or boots.
She may love it or hate it. I will say, if a kid loves a program, the people they meet and surrounding community they tend to learn to enjoy even the hardships or things that are different from home.
In general, students dress up a little more on the east coast compared to California. I know my older two kids often went to class in sweats (one was an athlete, but still) My son in Philly generally dressed business casual for class.
I’m not sure which programs you are looking at in Baltimore and Philly, but I have one at Curtis and he barely ever even leaves the building. Lives upstairs, has almost all classes, lessons, and rehearsals downstairs. Weather is not really an issue when you don’t have to go out in it! They do go out when it is nice weather, of course! My son came from a colder midwest city and does not feel the weather in Philly is bad at all.
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It’s a little quiet in here. I’m one of too many violinists applying for MM, though I am scrambling to put together a prescreening recording after some last-minute cancellations. I might have to DIY a video which will hopefully not be laughed at by the admissions committees. No idea how competitive things are for violinists this year either - I was keeping my list small because I frankly cannot afford all the application fees and travel expenses. Now I’m a little worried and considering casting a wider net!
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Thanks for the warning on Berklee lol It is so very interesting how different every school is.